


A Vigil of a Different Kind

by Kanthia



Series: Your Arms Like Towers [1]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: M/M, Mentions of Sex, Swearing, Vomiting, talk of death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-19
Updated: 2014-04-19
Packaged: 2018-01-19 23:00:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,041
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1487329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kanthia/pseuds/Kanthia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Of course it’s Erwin Smith who pulls up a chair to the couch, carrying a spoon and a bowl of what appears to be some kind of stew. Levi stretches his mouth into a thin line. It smells better than anything he’d ever eaten, and like hell he was going to give Smith the satisfaction of knowing that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Vigil of a Different Kind

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired in part by kittenteeth's "The quickest way to a man's heart is through his stomach" (http://archiveofourown.org/works/1451428). The image of Erwin as someone invested in his soldiers' nutrition stuck with me, and this is the result. Spoilers for the last chapter of A Choice With No Regrets.

Three weeks. Three weeks after the expedition, after dragging themselves back to the walls through pouring rain and knee-deep mud, three weeks after patching up wounds and cutting out gangrene and burying the memories of the dead, Levi collapses in the middle of a training exercise. They’d been working on techniques for close-range encounters on flat terrain, a joint endeavour cribbed from Isabel and Farlan, and Levi, standing up in a tree watching the whole debacle playing itself out under him, was trying to think about nothing in particular when suddenly his knees gave out -- he was sure of that, at least, because he was so used to being able to stand on his two feet -- and darkness rushed up to meet him. His last thought was of how ridiculous it was to be dying before Smith.

He awakes under a standard-issue blanket on a couch. Sunset is colouring the sky gold and throwing long shadows into the room (Erwin’s office, he knows, thinking back to the nights he’d spent scouting the location) and he shifts, winces at the pain that shoots up his side. Pushing through reveals that someone’s taken off his gear and his shirt, and bandaged up his chest, although a bit of poking and he’s mostly certain he hasn’t broken anything. He also notices, with some disgust, that his ribs are showing again. He’d thought himself better than that.

The office door opens to the smell of something warm and meaty. Levi’s stomach twists, and his arms feel cold and heavy. He’s hungry. It’s a feeling he hasn’t had since the days in the underground, that creeping numbness that comes after a few weeks of not enough food. Levi knows what it feels like to go hungry, has it down to a fine art.

So he’s not surprised that he’s less than enthused about the smell of stew, just angry that he’d been so careless with his body that he’d allowed himself to get hurt in front of other people.

Of course it’s Erwin Smith who pulls up a chair to the couch, carrying a spoon and a bowl of what appears to be some kind of stew. Levi stretches his mouth into a thin line. It smells better than anything he’d ever eaten, and like hell he was going to give Smith the satisfaction of knowing that.

“You managed to fire from both hips after you lost consciousness,” Erwin says. “Since you were oriented with your back to the ground, it caught on the branch you had fallen out of. Impact was chest-first.”

“Are you planning on feeding me?”

Erwin’s face softens. “I wouldn’t dare.” He passes Levi the bowl, stands up. Levi considers throwing it in his face, but the thought of wasting so much food is worse than playing into Erwin’s hand, so he takes a bite.

It’s good. It’s really, really good. It’s not too sweet and not too salty, warm but not too hot and the slightest bit spicy, with big pieces of potato soft enough for him to chew without working at it too hard. He takes a second bite, then a third, suppresses a groan. Erwin stands up and wipes his hands.

“This the rations they save for the higher-ups?” Levi knows better than to criticize the food they’re served in the barracks -- heck, the first few days he’d had to train himself to not hoard rations, and Isabel had been chewed out on more than one occasion for doing so -- but soldiers’ rations are salty as fuck, the potatoes mushy and the meat over-cured, the kind of stuff that was produced so the entire legion could eat quickly, the kind of stuff that reminded you that even if you were fed three times a day you still lived inside a cage.

“No,” Erwin says, stepping over to the desk and pulling out a sheaf of papers. “We’re served the same rations as everyone else, I’m afraid. I like to re-cook my rations when I can, to make them more palatable.”

So Smith is a priss with an easily upset stomach. Levi’s not surprised. He keeps eating, though, trying desperately to pace himself because he knows that he’ll puke if he eats too fast, and when he’s half done he looks up. Erwin’s scratching out ink, and meets his gaze.

“It’s all for you,” he says, softly. “Eat whatever you like.”

Levi finishes the whole thing, scrapes the bottom of the bowl clean, and wonders if he’ll regret it. Usually, eating that much that quickly would leave him unsettled, but instead, a warm feeling spreads out of his stomach into his fingers, drags his eyelids down. He puts the bowl down and pushes himself off of the couch, faltering on his feet. Erwin stands, but doesn’t approach.

“If you’re not going to stay here, go to the infirmary. Shadis’ orders.”

“Whatever,” Levi murmurs. Erwin looks him up and down, and Levi wonders if he’s looking for the part of him that died out there with Isabel and Farlan.

He stumbles out, swats away Erwin’s hand when the man tries to place a hand on his shoulder to steady him. By the time he makes it to the infirmary the pain in his side has migrated all over his chest, and he’s barely able to keep himself upright. A nurse forces him onto a bed, and he’s out before his head hits the mattress.

\----------

In the morning his bandages are changed, revealing the dark purple stain on his chest and side -- just a lot of bruising, the nurse says, and not internal hemorrhaging as they had originally feared. Despite his insistence on doing it himself she cleans and redresses the cuts, then fetches him a shirt and measures his height and weight. Orders come down from above: two full days of bed-rest. After the first half-day he’s going completely nuts, does push-ups and sit-ups while the nurse isn’t looking, and gets a huge chewing out for agitating his wounds. Erwin comes to check on him after a lunch he’s certain is larger than normal, with another bowl of stew.

Levi eats as Erwin stands at attention, silently, awkwardly. The nurse ambles back and has a quiet conversation with Erwin. He nods and dismisses the nurse, before turning back to Levi. Despite the taste of the stew -- it’s just as good as he remembered, with a nutty taste he didn’t know rations could have -- he only manages to finish half of it, given the size of his previous meal and the fact that he’d been in bed all morning.

“Finish it,” Erwin says.

“Not hungry,” Levi spits back, but has another spoonful.

“That’s an order.” Erwin smooths his own hair, and clasps his hands behind his back. The way he stands outlines the shape of his chest against his shirt, and Levi wonders if Erwin is the kind of person who regularly eats meat. “You’re on double rations until further notice, with daily weigh-ins.”

“Bullshit.”

“Call it what you want, but finish the bowl.”

Levi is of two minds. It’s good food, and the fact that it was either Erwin’s stew or another serving of salty potatoes is throwing him, but following orders has never been his strong suit. In a way that he can neither describe nor admit, he’s terrified of losing himself, being subsumed to someone else’s will.

The thought that he’s lost his inevitable way out -- the knowledge that one day Erwin’s blood would run red, and the three of them would be off with Lobov’s documents -- freezes the spoon halfway to his mouth. Erwin raises an eyebrow. Levi swallows a lump in his throat and finishes the bowl as fast as he can manage in order to get the man out of his face. Then, once Erwin has cleaned up and left, he lies back, rests a hand over his eyes, and tries not to think about the future.

\----------

He resumes regular training.

Now that he’s survived an expedition he’s gone up in rank and esteem, and they no longer treat him like a trainee. There’s a level of quiet respect in the dining hall that he’s not used to, people who congregate around him and talk as though he’s listening -- and he is, sometimes. Hanji in particular he doesn’t mind, for all his intent to kill her earlier. She takes some of the food off his plate when the commander isn’t looking, eats it with enough relish that he can tell she’s joking, but also that she’s grown up without enough to eat, and it gives him a feeling of solidarity.

Erwin has secured permission from up top to personally look after part of Levi’s meals (because they don’t trust him to finish everything, Levi’s certain) and so after afternoon training, when the rest of the corps is packing it in for dinner, he slinks up to Erwin’s office. He sits on the couch and eats an enormous portion in silence as Erwin goes over paperwork, a bowl of his own on his desk. Today it tastes like some kind of herb. There’s a kettle over the fireplace brewing tea. Levi is profoundly uncomfortable, and it isn’t just the food in his belly, or the fact that Erwin has opened the top button of his shirt. It’s strange, having someone look after him like this. He doesn’t know what to make of it. He decides he doesn’t like it.

There’s an accusation on the tip of his tongue, something that sounds like _they died so I could learn a stupid lesson I should’ve known from the start_ , something that sounds like _I’m waiting for you to tell me what you want in return_. Nobody feeds anyone for free. Levi’s waiting for Erwin to move around in his chair and pull out his dick.

He checks himself. That’s an odd thought -- not what he was expecting. He probes the thought again, and his cock twitches in response. After almost four weeks his libido’s come back suddenly, at the most unexpected time. He curses under his breath, loud enough that Erwin hears him, turns, and catches on.

“Can’t say my food has had that effect before,” he says, with a hint of a smile. “I must be getting better.”

“Fuck you,” Levi growls. He’s not fifteen, hasn’t been like this in years.

“You’re welcome to use the officers’ washroom. Two doors down on the left. Has a working lock and a running tap.”

Levi doesn’t. He finishes eating, ignoring the painful strain against his zipper, and when he’s done he gets up and slams down the bowl on Erwin’s desk. Erwin looks up. He’s so goddamn tall that his head is level with Levi’s hips, and for a long moment Levi’s worried he’ll lose it. Then he turns, marches stiffly out of the office and down the hall, and once he’s found a supply closet, only then does he give himself the satisfaction of a little privacy.

\----------

In the barracks’ courtyard, behind the stables, it’s almost silent -- the corps are all sleeping, the horses shuffling quietly, lights-out was two hours prior. Levi’s working off stress and anger and the feeling of a full stomach with a wooden knife and a training dummy the size and shape of a human being. His body still remembers every way to kill a man with a sharp edge, and as he strikes (neck, chest, gut, junk) he tries to imagine Smith, but gets a mental picture of Lobov’s agent instead. The quickest way to a man’s heart is, as always, through his ribcage.

After a half-hour he’s worked up a pretty decent sweat, and he’s so lost in his thoughts that he doesn’t catch Erwin coming up behind him.

“You know, trainees are given instruction in hand-to-hand combat,” Smith says. Levi turns and tenses, throws a punch. Erwin catches it, his mouth set in a grim smile. “Have you ever wondered why?”

Levi throws another punch. Erwin catches it easily in his other hand. There’s so much anger in Levi's body, an emotion he barely remembers is gritting his teeth and calling for him to draw blood. 

“This world’s a piece of shit,” he breathes, “ _That’s why._ ” 

He aims a knee for his nuts. Erwin sidesteps, wrenches his arms down, then knees him in the stomach with such devastating force that Levi goes down, clutching his front. He retches once, twice, loses his dinner on Erwin’s boots. Erwin kneels and Levi braces himself for a blow that never comes, only bristles when Erwin rubs the back of his neck as he retches until he feels like he’s turning his empty stomach inside out, hot tears pricking the corners of his eyes. 

Finally, he glares up, wipes the side of his mouth.

“You gonna kick me out of the corps?” There’s blood on his hand. “Send my ass back to where you found me? Call the Unicorns and throw my corpse into a jail at the bottom of a sewer?”

Something plays across Erwin’s face. “This world does have its problems,” he says, quietly. He holds out a hand, and Levi is forced to make a choice. “But at least, here, we offer direct repercussions in return for actions. Take my hand.”

Levi takes the hand, and Erwin helps him to his feet. 

“Follow me.”

He follows him.

He follows him, the fight sucked out of him, back to the infirmary where Erwin rouses the nurse. She checks him over and declares that he’s fine, just a little shaken. He follows him back to Erwin’s office, where the officer pulls some extra rations out of a bag and stokes the fire, tosses him an apple. As he’s eating, Erwin cooks up some kind of thinly sliced meat and shredded potato in a little bit of oil -- not too greasy, not too hot. 

He waits for Erwin to make the inevitable demand through the meal, order him to strip, or kneel.

“It’s not safe to be out alone at night, even so close to the barracks,” Erwin says, instead, because nothing that comes out of his mouth is as expected. “If you’re interested in extra training, I leave for a run every morning ten minutes after the wake-up bell. Wear your gear.”

\----------

Erwin sets a punishing pace for someone so fucking huge. Over time, though, Levi teaches him not to underestimate him for his size, and inevitably they’re caught up in a game of one-upmanship: kilometers ran, squat-thrusts, crunches. Levi can do more pull-ups, Erwin can do more push-ups. People start watching. People join in. Soon half the corps is jogging in formation outside of regular training, and at Erwin’s insistence funds are funnelled into better food. A cook is hired, a real cook, out of the Garrison with training in combat medicine and nutrition; she comes three times a week to offer extra lessons. Levi sits in the back of the lecture hall, managing a bowl of stew, while she talks about complex carbohydrates and sunstroke.

Eventually he’s taken off of double rations, starts to eat dinner with the regular crew again. Though he doesn’t miss the special treatment, he misses the taste of Erwin’s stew, that rich, nutty taste he’d learned was broth made from the meat of boar.

On the evening at his final daily weigh-in he learns that he’s up ten kilograms and exactly one inch in height, which he supposes is better than nothing. It’s only after she’s dismissed him to get dressed that he catches himself in a mirror. It’s newly installed, an expensive waste of time gifted by some fat pig in Sina, and for a moment he thinks it’s someone else -- but of course not, that’s his head on a soldier’s body, a parody of the piece of shit he used to be: hard lines, solid edges, lean muscle, it’s enough to make him want to puke.

He marches straight up to Erwin’s office as soon as he's dressed, but Erwin is in a meeting with Shadis, and as Levi waits outside he’s increasingly certain that Erwin is being groomed to take over. As Shadis leaves the commander gives Levi a terse nod, and Levi pushes his way in. Erwin’s bent over his desk, organizing papers, turns to Levi with a look of confusion.

“You did this,” Levi growls, balling his hands into fists. “You knew that I was -- you planned this all from the beginning, didn’t you? The stew, the little fucking morning jogs --”

Erwin’s face softens, and he straightens. “Everyone has their own way of mourning,” he says, quietly, as he strides over. He’s tall and strong and calculating and Levi will never be anything like him, but he’s also the first and last person in the world who would do something for a starving mess of a soldier and expect nothing in return except, perhaps, the promise of a future of service. Levi doesn’t know what to make of that. He’s angry that Erwin caught him off guard, again, because every time Erwin catches him off guard he does it in a way that makes Levi feel like he should have seen it coming two thousand years prior.

“Shit,” Levi says, because he’s out of words, and out of anger. Isabel and Farlan are dead, and he’s trapped in the Survey Corps, completely taken by this man with his cool eyes and his sturdy, caring heart.

“I couldn’t let you go,” Erwin says, in response. He gathers Levi into him, his chest a buffer against Levi’s tears, the whole situation becoming clear: this is a life sentence, and it has been from the beginning. The moment he and Erwin had locked eyes he was doomed to die in the service of humanity, and Erwin is prepared to do everything in his power to stop him from meeting his end in any lesser way.

It isn’t much, but it’s something, his life having meaning to someone -- it’s not a feeling he particularly likes, but he supposes he can get used to it. Eventually his tears run dry. Things that are lost can only be mourned for so long.

Levi’s stomach growls. Erwin smiles. “Tea?”

_What a man._

Levi nods, chuckles, and puts on a kettle.

**Author's Note:**

> You can also find me on [tumblr](http://kanthia.tumblr.com/)!


End file.
